You Asked. I’m Delivering. Introducing Our “Ask Jen” Feature.

It’s really so AWESOME to lead this midlife reinvention project for women like you! (For example, the response rate to our survey was SEVEN TIMES the national average for that kind of thing. You all are super-involved ninja mid-life warrior mavens. So cool!)

At any rate, a few things are REALLY REALLY clear from your responses.

I’m launching an “Ask Jen” series to answer your questions about midlife reinvention. Starting in May — which is NEXT week, in case you’re in menopausal calendar drift – we’re gonna add an experimental Q&A series to our space.

Our experiment is designed to solve your unique challenges – the ones that hold YOU PERSONALLY back from fully expanding into the Second Journey life you want.

Rather than run the series in a “hit or miss” fashion, we’re going to take a deeper dive into a really dogmatic issue, so that you can really, really, for REAL, tease out effective strategies for overcoming the stuff that holds you back.

To do this, I’m organizing our series in a “Tag. You’re IT!” daisy chain fashion.

What that means is that I’ll begin with a piece that solves a really tricky challenge and then I’ll open our virtual floor (via our Wisdom Circle comment section) for your follow up questions.

I’ll select one or more of those questions, and then help you solve that problem in the next “episode” of the series.

If we were running our series on daytime television, we might call it “As the Menopausal Burns.”

So what topic are we playing with in May?????

The one you asked for.

In our survey, you told me that your biggest barrier to change was – HANDS DOWN – FEAR.

Much of the time, our fears aren’t always real, in that they are actually true. But our lizard brain doesn’t get that. To our hard-wired brain, EVERY fear is REAL.

So, we begin our series with strategies, tips, and really really kick-ass solutions for putting that T-Rex boogey man back in the dinosaur museum where he belongs.

I find that the best way to teach someone how to do something is through demonstrating our new skill in action.

So, I begin our series with me, overcoming one fear – and showing you how I’m doing it. The fear I’m overcoming is adding new technology to our space.

So, I made a video. It’s got a really, really good Jen-like message. But it’s not as prettily perfect as I wanted it to be. My hair’s not perfect. I don’t like the way my neck looks. I say “um” a few times and stumble over one or two words.

By the way, that’s my new nose ring. And when I replay the video, sometimes the image and my words are out of sync. I’ll have to figure that out, too.

The point is, to overcome your fear, you just have to GET STARTED. You have to be willing to be seen as a “newcomer” and you have to just decide that you don’t mind showing your ass just a little.

To”overcome” something you have to “come over” and just get started.

So, here’s my very first Life After Tampons imperfect video. It’s really, really short, because we work in Baby Steps on new stuff.

After you watch the video, ask away!!!

In the Wisdom Circle space below, share with us what today’s lesson sparks for you about overcoming fear. (I’d be really okay if one or two of you says something nice about my neck, or my hair, or the imperfect way I make the “sssss” sound.)

I’ll pick one or two of your “Ask Jen” questions and answer them next time.

Sassy, Classy, and Kick-Assy! You’re BEAUTIFUL babe!
You looked confident and sounded great.
Today I’m focusing on gratitude and choosing to be happy no matter what, so nothing is coming up for me around fear at the moment.
Thank you for putting yourself out there and allowing yourself to be vulnerable. That is true grit, girl!
love’n’light,
Patty

Love it, Jen! This is what I’m talkin’ about! BTW, I think you look great. Honestly, I’d rather see a little imperfection (although you claim there was in your video, I didn’t see it). When we see videos that are so professionally done with the perfect expensive lighting and camera, then it all just seems too impossible for the average person to do themselves. Especially for us “over 50 women” that weren’t brought up with all this technology. We’d rather see a normal real situation and then we feel, “hey, I can do that, too!” And your hair and neck look great! We’re not in our 20’s. We shouldn’t have to think we need to look like we are. I’ve always thought that a campaign needs to be started that turns the whole beauty thing around and a few well placed wrinkles and sags are the new “face of beauty” and those young smooth faces are pitied! Seriously, you and I could be the chairwomen of that campaign! Who’s with us on this?
OK, anyway, I get easily distracted – As far as my fears, I pretty much go for whatever I want. I find that I actually have a lot less fears as my over 50 self than I did when younger and still trying to find myself. One thing that helps me in anything that seems overwhelming is to break it down into baby steps instead of looking at one big monster that needs to be overcome. For example, let’s say you want to write a book – just start with a page, or a paragraph. Add to it one little paragraph at a time and before you know it, you just wrote a book!
If I had to pick a fear at this stage of my life, I think right now it would be – maintaining health and income in order to continue enjoying my current lifestyle.
Well, didn’t mean to write a book here on your website, but as you can tell, your website and subjects are near and dear to my heart!
Keep up the good work.
Nina Knoxhttp://over50andhappy.com

As my kid would say, “Awesomesauce!!!” And I’m with you on the new face of beauty. I actually think marketers are slowly catching on, Nina. We midlifers are the LARGEST demographic out there. And we have buying power. And thank you. You make me like my neck.

OH YEAH! Well done, Jen…I love you in video! As you have such humor about life, I will admit to half expecting you to make your pt by actually showing ‘a bit of ass’ (nothing racy, mind you…I know you are professional…just the intimation of turning around!) Thank you for taking the risk and exposing yourself. I am confident that the feedback will show it paid off in spades!

It is strange, this fear thing. On any given day, I can feel like I have the world in hand. When fear sneaks in and settles in my hormone addled brain, it is in the form of ‘maybe it is too late’…’maybe all of those things you know you are capable of, can’t be reached, can’t be attained with the time you have left.’ Rationale tells me that it’s ridiculous. It is a niggling and somewhat nebulous feeling, pervasive but hard to pin down-so distracting, disruptive, destructive.

Thank you for this forum and congrates on facing your fear. You are a lesson in action…the best kind! Cheers!

I enjoyed your first video and if you didn’t point out all the “shortcomings”, I wouldn’t have noticed them. The thing that came through, loud and clear, was your message. The part about admitting your fear, face-it and move forward really resonated with me — such simple advice but the part I lose sight of amidst all the worry. Thanks for sharing, I’m looking forward to this series.